Psalm chapter 40, and we'll be
looking at verse 1 together tonight. Psalm chapter 40 and verse 1
says, Blessed is he who considers or considereth the poor. The
Lord will deliver him in time of trouble. The title of the
message this evening is A Blessed Consideration. a blessed consideration. Now, this psalm in chapter 41,
this is the third of the benediction psalms. There are three other
psalms, and if some of you would say it's four, benediction Psalms,
but two of them says the same thing, so we're going to say
there's three. There are three benediction Psalms before this
that include who is the blessed man, the blessed man. If you
remember Psalm chapter one and verse one, it says, blessed,
blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly,
nor standeth in the way of sinners. nor sitteth in the seat of the
scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in
that law doth he meditate day and night. The second blessed
psalm would be Psalm 32 and verse 1. Blessed is he whose transgression
is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom
the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is
no guile. And the third one would be Psalm
34, verse 8. Oh, taste and see that the Lord
is good. Blessed is the man that trusted
in him. Blessed is the man. And then
now we have our text that said, blessed is he who considers the
poor. I'll tell you that all of these
verses that I have just read to you speak of one man. One who is the truly blessed
man, Jesus Christ. He who by nature is God-blessed
forever, the eternal Son of God, equal with the Father and the
Spirit, and was from all eternity blessed in all the holy perfections
of God. He is truly the blessed man. He is the immutable, holy, and
just, omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent God who lacks nothing,
nor does He need anything from His creatures to make Him happy. That's what that word blessed
is. It means happy. You see, God only is happy in
Himself. God was always happy in Himself. There was never anything that
God lacked from all eternity. And even as He created all things,
none of these things added one thing to His happiness. God was
always blessed. Christ, the Son of God, was always
blessed and happy. And so in his blessed contentment,
God in sovereign immutable grace, the blessed, perfect and happy
God from all eternity also purposed to save an elect people for himself. He purposed to save a chosen
people, not because they were good, Not because their works
were great, not because they were strong, not because of their
abilities, not because of anything He would see good in them. He
chose them only because He would have them for Himself. There
is no other reason. God was content Himself. He didn't
have to choose anyone. He didn't have to create anything.
But He did so according to His own sovereign will and for the
praise of the glory of His own grace. As it says in Ephesians
chapter 1, that everything is to the glory of God. God does
everything for His own glory. And so too the Son of God willingly
loved the elect. As God the Father chose them,
God the Son also willingly loved them and agreed to be their surety. He agreed to take upon Himself
their nature, the nature of His people. Why? So that He might
reconcile them to God. So that He might bring His people
to God. And so he thus became a man that
by his righteousness and death, he can and did reconcile his
people to himself. Philippians chapter 2 and verse
6, talking of Christ, who being in the form of God, the nature
of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made
of himself no reputation. If you look up that phrase, no
reputation, it means vanity. The Lord Jesus Christ made himself
vanity. No reputation, he took upon him
the form of a servant. And being made in the likeness
of men and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself
and became obedient even unto the death of the cross. Now,
Jesus, the blessed son of God, in grace, condescended, condescended
to become a man, a man. In other words, he took in union
with his deity, our nature. He became absolutely a man. As much as he was God, he became
man. And as much as he is man, he
is God. He truly is the only God-man
who is blessed forever. Blessed forever. He was the blessed
man who would not compromise with sin. God says, who is like
my servant who is both blind and deaf? What was he blind and
deaf to? To sin. To sin. He could not
sin. He was the blessed man who walked
not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stood in the way of sinners,
nor sat in the seat of the scornful. But his delight was in the law
of the Lord, and in that law did Christ meditate both day
and night. Who else can that be speaking
of? Which one of us ever manifested,
meditated in the law of God day and night? No one. No one but this one, the blessed
man, Christ. The heart of Christ was set to
obey the law. He said, I came not to destroy
the law, but to fulfill the law. And his delight was in the law
of God. And he magnified the law. In
Isaiah 42, 21, the Lord said that he was pleased for his righteousness
sake. He will magnify the law and make
it honorable. And he did. Christ, the blessed
man, made the law honorable. Second of all, he is the blessed
man because in him there was no guile. There was no sin. In Himself there was no sin. He was the sinless, perfect Son
of God. And yet, because He was the sinless
Son of God, He was to be the sin-bearer. He was to be the
sin-bearer. He was to bear the weight of
all the sins of all His people. And Jesus Christ did bear the
guilt and the weight of our sins. He did bear our iniquities in
His own body on the tree. Yet know this, even though He
was made sin for us, yet He knew no sin at the same time. He was still the spotless Lamb
of God who was made sin. It is a mystery, but it is the
gospel. It is the gospel. had no iniquity
of his own, and he was the spotless Lamb of God. And friends, by
his bearing our sins, when his blood poured out, he washed away
all of the sins that he bore. Therefore, he sits at the throne
of God right now, and God no more imputes iniquity to him.
Why? He's already done it. He's already
done it. Number three, he is a blessed
man because he alone trusted God. He alone trusted God. Which one of us has ever trusted
God completely? Imagine this when Christ bore
our sins in his own body on the tree. And God Himself forsook
Christ, turned His back on His own beloved Son. Even then Christ
said, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? He still trusted
in God even though He was forsaken of God. He trusted God. And in our text, we see that
He is again called the blessed man Because of this, Christ is
the blessed man because he considereth the poverty of man. Look at that
in our text. Blessed is he. Blessed is Christ
who considers or considereth the poor. Now, in all those other texts
that I've just briefly went over with you, all of those other
texts describe the blessed man in his relationship to God. He
obeyed the law of God, delight in the law of God. He was a sinless
son of God who bore our sins and now is seated perfectly on
the throne of God. And he is the blessed man because
he always trusted God. Now, then it is this text is
in relationship not to God, but he is the blessed man in relationship
to the impoverished. To the impoverished, to the poor. Jesus is called the blessed man
because of his compassion towards men. It was from all eternity, friends,
that Jesus Christ considered the poverty of his people. He, from all eternity, considered
our poverty. Now, we know that God does consider
those who are poor in this world, does he not? those who have need
and lack of things? Is it not our God that provides
those things? Does He not consider the lilies?
Does He not consider the ravens? Does He not consider the poor?
Of course He does. No man has anything but God give
it to him. No man, none of us have food
or raiment or clothes unless God give it to him. Matter of
fact, we own nothing. Isn't that right? Is there anything
that actually you and I own that is ours? No. It's all given of
God. Everything we have is a gift
of God. Surely God takes care of the
needs of the impoverished, but this is not speaking of temporal,
physical poverty. This is speaking of a spiritual
poverty. Spiritual poverty. All men by nature are in great
poverty because of sin. Poverty. And I'll tell you this,
I can confess this, that in this life I have really not understood
the full weight of what it is to be impoverished. We all have,
you know, things. We all have these comforts of
this life. You know, I see some people,
and you see them on television, we have no idea how impoverished
that is. But whatever that is, in relationship
to our nature, it is infinitely worse. Infinitely worse. Man by nature is in great poverty
because he is in great debt. Debt unto God. When man was created in the image
of God, he had everything. He was rich in every way. He
had righteousness. He had holiness. Adam, our father,
he had communion with God. And the earth brought forth the
strength of their seeds. And he had everything at his
disposal. God even gave him a helpmate
to love that was like him. He loved him and had communion
with him. And there was only one thing
that God said was his. He said, this is mine, don't
eat it. And what did our Father do? Our
Father in rebellion took that which belonged unto God only. He robbed God of His glory. Robbed God of His glory. And
God's justice immediately, swiftly fell on our father Adam. And
when it fell on him, it fell on us. And we died. Even the day that he died, we
died in our father. For whereas by one man many were
made sinners. The disobedience of our father
hath made us all sinners. And not only by his disobedience,
but also by our own actions, we are made sinners. And so all of us have sinned
and come short of the glory of God. We have all sinned, and
the wages of sin is death. There is no escaping that. Therefore, we have nothing, nothing, whereby we may pay the
debt we owe to God. You see, it's an infinite debt.
your sin and my sin to each other is not infinite. Matter of fact,
if you do something to me, my mind's not so great. I'll probably
forget it. God is altogether immutable,
unchangeable. And when we sin against God,
we sin against an infinitely holy and just God. And all sin
has its punishment in death. All sin must be paid for. must be paid for. The Scripture says without the
shedding of blood, there is no remission. Men love
to dream of remission without blood. If there is ever a message that
has not the blood of Christ as its theme, as its subject, and
running through the whole message, it is not the gospel. Blood is
the gospel. You see, blood is the only thing
that pays for sin. The problem is, our blood is
worthless. Our blood is worthless. How much
more worthless than our actions, our religion, our works? How low then is the poverty of
man? It is so low that our best efforts,
our best religions are of no value to satisfy God's justice. But Christ, but Christ being
the blessed man has considered this already. Isn't that wonderful? Before you are in trouble, that
someone considers your trouble and takes care of it. That's
exactly what it is that Christ has done. He has considered our
trouble even before there was trouble. He considered it. He considered it. Considered
our poverty, our spiritual poverty. Jesus thought of His people from
eternity as they were His delight, His pleasure, and His love. In Proverbs chapter 8 it says,
of Christ, he said, rejoicing in the habitable part of the
earth, and my delights were with the sons of men. When he was brought up with God, he said, my delight was in my
people. I considered them, I thought
of them and their needs. Now the word in our text, considereth. It doesn't mean to just think
about something. How many times have we thought
about somebody, thought to do something for somebody, but never
did it? What good did that do them? Nothing. We didn't do it. But this Word
has more to it than just to think about it. If Christ the Lord
only purposed to save us, but never came and accomplished that,
none of us would ever have been saved. So this word, considereth,
does not only mean to think about, but it also means to act. It also means to act. This word is to act upon the
objects, to make understanding, or to go among them and to know
what it is to be one of them. Isn't that something? He not
only thought of us, which is a miracle in and of itself, it
says, what is man that thou art mindful of him, and the son of
man that thou considerest him. But He not only thought about
us, He not only purposed our salvation, He actually came and
became one of us. One of us. He became a man as
one of us. So when we say, the blessed man
considereth the poor, It's telling us that He thought of us so much
so as to take action to understand and to know us, to take action
and to give the poor what they have need of. Christ took not the form of angels,
the Scripture says, but He took the seed of Abraham. Wherefore,
in all things it behooved Him to be made like unto His brethren,
that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things
pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of his people. For
in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is also able
to succor them that are tempted." There's not one thing you have
gone through that Christ has not infinitely gone through himself. There's not one thing that you
have suffered. that Christ Himself has not infinitely
suffered already. You see, He not only considered
your poverty, He also took it upon Himself to save you, to redeem you. When Jesus became a man, He took
upon Him all the infirmities, sorrows, griefs, and troubles,
excluding sin. He who was rich in glory, in
praise, and majesty from old eternity, emptied himself and
became a man and veiled his deity and became subject to his own
law. Why? So that he might give us the
riches of his righteousness. Scripture says that not one of
us have done anything good. There is none that doeth good,
no, not one. Poverty. You see, you and I are
poor in righteousness. We have none. The problem is
God demands perfect righteousness. So the blessed man, having considered
us, he has come to provide what we have need of. He has come
to provide righteousness as a man. As a man. But now the righteousness
of God without the law is manifest. Being witnessed by the law and
the prophets, even the righteousness of God, which is by the faithfulness
of Jesus Christ unto all them that believe. For there is no
difference. Jesus became the subject became
subject to the will of God and to his own law, so as to justify
us before God. That's why he came. That's why
he came. He came because he considered
you. He considered you. Friends, all things are of God. who hath reconciled us to himself
by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation,
to wit, God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not imputing
their trespasses to them." Is that not a wonderful thing? You
mean, I had debt unto God and God was not willing to impute
it to me? He was not willing to charge
it to me? Well, if God is just and He must
punish sin, where did it go? Where did the debt go? It went
to the blessed man, the Scripture says, for He hath made him to
be sin for us. See, sin was never swept under
the rug. It was never pretended to be
punished. It was punished! And it was punished
in the blessed man. He himself became impoverished
with our sins. It was our sins that separated
us from God. But now Christ has considered
our poverty. Christ has come among us to be
our substitute so that Christ being the man of God had all
of the sins of His people imputed to Him. And He was made to bear the guilt
before God and suffered under the wrath of God's justice for
His people. Now friends, we were impoverished
because of our own sin. How much more impoverished was
Christ when He took on all the sins of all His people? How low must He have condescended to take our dead and to pay for our sins under
the justice of his own father. Blessed is Christ who has considered
his people. That he, by his life and death,
not only purposed to save us. But friends, he has accomplished
everything He purposed to do. It's done. He is the blessed
man because He considered the poverty of His people. He considered the poverty of
His people. Secondly, this will be a little shorter, blessed
is the man who considers the poverty of Christ. This works
both ways. I love the Psalms because they
show the union between Christ and His people. Whatever belongs
to Christ belongs to me. He is the blessed man who considered
my poverty and saved me and made me rich before God. But also,
I am the blessed man in that I have considered Him by the
power of the Holy Spirit and faith in Him. Christ truly is the blessed man.
We are the blessed man if we consider the poverty of Christ.
Now, Christ is the blessed man because He humbled Himself to
consider the poor in spirit, the elect of God, that had nothing
to pay for their sins. And as He accomplished their
righteousness and redemption, even so, all of His elect consider
Him, and by faith they come and rest in His finished work. Not
one of those that Christ considered, not one of them will ever be
lost. But all of them will come to
consider Him. Every one of them that Christ
died for will come by faith and believe on Christ. They will. This is the work of the Holy
Spirit. This is the work of the Holy Spirit. The wind bloweth
where it listeth. You can hear the sound thereof,
but you can't tell where it's coming and where it's going.
Even so is everyone that is born of the Spirit of God. Friends,
this work of salvation is not of him that willeth, nor him
that runneth, but God that showeth mercy. And when the Word of God
is preached, when the blessed man is declared, The Spirit of
God is the one that takes the message and applies it to the
hearts of men. He, by the power of His mercy,
comes in with the Gospel and applies it to our hearts, so
that we who would not consider Him, now consider Him. Now consider Him. When He is
preached as the victorious Savior, who by his death conquered sin,
death, and hell, this message in the time of love is applied.
And when the Spirit comes in power, this gospel will expose
our poverty. Have you been exposed? Has the
Spirit of God laid naked your soul before God and seen what
poverty, what sin we are by nature? If he has, that's a good thing.
That's not a bad thing. Because everyone that is exposed
of their sin truly considers Christ. They truly see that Christ
is the blessed man. And their hope ceases to be in
their own works. It ceases to find comfort in
the the things that they've done, or the people that they've met,
or the people they know, or what their religion is, they cling
to Christ. Christ becomes all their hope. All their joy. So low did the Son of God condescend
on the cross for us. that He said, I am a worm and
no man. Have you considered that? Have
you considered how low the Lord Jesus Christ had to condescend
to take away our sins? I've considered it, but I've
not found an end to it. And yet when He poured out His
soul unto death, God was satisfied with His offering. Have you considered
that? Have you considered that God
is completely and absolutely perfectly satisfied with Christ? Have you considered that your
faith is not even of yourself? It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast. Have you considered that? Have
you considered this? Christ is coming again. Have
you considered that? He is coming to take us home
to be with Him forever. Have you considered that? That
you, right now, in this present world, you are as righteous as
God Himself in the inner man. In that new man that God created
in you, it is absolutely perfect and holy. I didn't say nothing
about the old man. The old man is just as sinful
and wicked as the day he was born. Yea, more sinful. He's
learned more wicked devices as he's grown. But that inner man
is perfect. Consider it. Christ made it.
He accomplished it. Shall He not come again and receive
us unto Himself? You bet He will. You bet He will. And lastly, let us consider this
and learn this. Even as Christ has considered
us, let us also consider the poor. Have you considered the lost
around you? Have you considered those who
need to hear Christ? Have you considered the needs
of your brethren? Have you considered your need
to forgive one another, even as Christ has forgiven you? I'll tell you, if this mind was
in us, that mind that was in Christ, we would be an humble
people. Let this mind be in you, which
was in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought it
not Robert to be equal with God. Friends, we have been made the
righteousness of God in Him, but that's not anything of ourselves.
There's no boasting here. There's no boasting in me. So I'm not going to exalt myself
above you. I want to take care of you because Christ considered me.
Because I consider him, I consider you. I pray that God will bless this
to our hearts. Let's stand and be dismissed
in prayer.